The mission went smoothly. I had already collected a tremendous amount of data on the expansion of biological life in the periphery of a remote galaxy locals call Milky way. I was about to warp back to the mothership when Abigail, the ship’s AI, called me: “Hey darling, suspect occurrences of biological life straight ahead! According to the various frequencies I monitor, it looks like a mad stellar system.”

 

My job is to explore and report on sentient species that have developed a complex technology but haven’t, unfortunately, reached the minimal level of emotional maturity necessary to be allowed interaction with the big universe.

As I orbited close the the central star of the system, an unsuspected solar flare burnt all the delicate circuits of my ship’s AI. Abigail inoperative, the rudimentary rescue system landed –– or more precisely crashed –– the ship on the shore of an unknown planet.

I’m still waiting for rescue.

crash
crash
crash
crash
crash
crash
crash
crash